Institute for Transportation

While timber bridges can perform well under a variety of conditions, many bridges experience premature internal decay due to poor specification, inadequate preservative treatment or poor construction practices. Arresting deterioration in these bridges poses a major challenge since the wood under attack is normally deep beneath the surface treatments and is highly resistant to impregnation by most conventional liquids. In this
report, we discuss the use of fumigants and water diffusible fungicides for arresting these attack and preventing renewed invasion. The benefits of the two chemistries are discussed in relation to the potential for attacks and speed of control required.